Miles to go..

Jagajith Singh went on singing:

“Is Duniya Mein Apna Kya hein?
Kahne Tho sub kuch Apna Hein…”

[In this world, what is mine?
If I say so,  I can  say everything is mine...]

Putting on the first invariable thing in the journey, the headphone, Rema relaxed to the second invariable factor – the side seat of the train. Train started whistling. A journey through the greenish luxury of Kerala for 45 minutes. Less tiring, less distance and faster reach – while detailing too many excuses for choosing train over bus, deep inside her heart she knows why she prefers train journey to bus. Its the nostalgia that the  Train evokes while running through the green paddy fields with a clear horizon making timely border for it, depending on the time of train. The kid inside her breaks loose on this sight; she never wastes the chances to do it.

Leaning back to the seat, she just formed an outline of her program for the day. A feature about the eminent poet of the language- with interview. In case he is not able to talk much, because of his old age, the feature would go too short.  She took a mental note of the information to be added as introduction and description. His bond with River, – as to train for me (?), she smiled. The old woman next to her started watching her with apprehension- family, Awards… The details that even every kid knows. She always finds it hard to bind herself to the clichés of reporting. An idea suddenly struck her. The report can be based on his latest poem – “Musafir”. A description about the poem will fill the gaps. Since her notepad was in the bag under the seat, not wasting time, she just tore a piece from the brown paper in which her Amma packed her “Unniyappam”, and wrote the matter and secured  it in her purse.

Words started forming in her mind. Let the starting be with the Prophet Mohammed – “this world is a resting place which you have to pass for reaching the next world”. A few kids waved from a distance towards the train. The train answered with a long whistle. She closed her eyes.

Rema alighted to the burning heat of the city towards 2 O’clock in the noon. To reach office fast, she caught an auto rickshaw. The driver turned his attention to the signal after successfully reaching first at the traffic signal. She tried to concentrate on the matter in the “Unniyappam” paper. But a song roused her from thoughts.

“O Duniya ke rekhwaale…”

It was not the gymnastic techniques that the  kid was showing with a ring in his hand, which shocked Rema. But, he was showing it just in front of the bikes, which were impatiently “whrooming” for the traffic signal to turn Green. Traffic has always been a headache for her. Even after 4 years of migrating to the city, she still crossed the roads running. Her friends always made fun of her saying this.

While her conscience was continuing the debate on whether to pull him from there or not, the signal turned green. The auto driver raced forward.  The gymnast boy calmly walked to the next set of vehicles with the ring in his hand.

“Unniyappam” paper just lay in her purse. Somehow, she thought about Subhash then. “Life is a drama; and we all are mere actors in it” – He quoted Shakespeare to a frightened and tearful Rema who happened to see an accident on the way to their Chemistry Exam. The friend who consoled her  that thinking about the last act of the drama should be done only after the drama gets over, and that it is time to put on make-up on for the next act, the Chemistry Exam. The friend who met with an accident, during one of the acts of his life. While waiting for the drama to end, he wrote a summary of his previous acts – “Before the drama of life ends…” Before the flood of awards reached in search for him, the curtain had fallen for his life.

One of his sentences from the book, used to prick her – “Live your life thinking  that each moment is the last moment”. While stepping down at the end of friendship, which rained as wind, and sometimes thunderstorm and sometimes, mere rain, she knew that they regretted a lot. Regretted about the untold words, regretted about the good words they kept aside because of their ego, regretted about all the good moments sunk in severe fights for stupid reasons, for all the feelings they kept away from each other…

The painful question that whether those last words were for her, used to silence her at times when she thought of him. The picture of Subhash putting on make-up for the next act with a slight smile inspired her to keep her personality while pursuing reports, even in the midst of the urge of channels to celebrate life.

****

Interview went ahead as expected. Instead of the usual questions and answers, Rema endeavored to draw the picture of his life from the eminent poet’s poems. He walked with her with that ever warm smile. Past the naughty childhood and the whims of the adolescence, they reached the present. Just hinting that the interview is about to get over, she moved onto the next question. “Passing all these stages of life, when you reach the poem “Musafir”, do you feel that it is a summary of what went before? Or was “Musafir” an account of things which you couldn’t finish in your life so far?” He closed his eyes for a moment and told Rema – “Come”…

Inside his reading room, he showed her a notebook. Neat round letters, which anyone would find familiar. At least one studious kid in a class would have such handwriting. “This book made me write Musafir”. Rema raised her head from the book on a questioning glance. Instead, he recited two lines from “Musafir”.

“Whenever I walked away, stopping each word half way,

I Didn’t think this drama had an end, or didn’t I have to think that at all?”

He continued –

“The man came to see me with this book some time back. Somehow, our views about life were the same.  We talked a lot. When I moved forward with the worsds of Shakespeare that “life is a Drama”, he just sat silent for a moment, and then gave me this book. The book was titled, “Corrections in the script of life” without the author’s name. He wished me good luck with tears in his eyes and left the house. “

“With all the curiosity, I opened that book and read. I understood that it was his diary. A diary mixed with the things he said each day and also things he wanted to tell that day. Later, he published an edited version of that Diary with the title “Before the drama of life ends…””

Subhash!! She turned the pages of that book. Their days lay in front of her in blue letters – her eyes flooding.

***

Rema had put on makeup for the next act by the time she was returning from the interview. She was thinking only about the title of the program and the introduction. While she was pondering over the conclusion, the car stopped at the traffic signal again. When the gymnast boy lay on the road again in front of the bikes and started showing is skills with the  ring, she came back from her thoughts to the red reality of traffic signal with a thud.

She didn’t think twice. Putting off the make up for the present act, she ran to the boy. While running back to the car dragging him with her, she hummed a soft song in the satisfaction of a corrected script…